First Amendment News

As a counter weight to local journalism with a hidden political bias and unknown funders, the nonprofit State Newsroom has emerged with newsrooms in 50 states dedicated to covering state politics and policy. Donors do not dictate editorial opinion and reporters are nonpartisan although the guiding mission is to be progressive without defining what that might be. (Columbia Journalism Review, April 5, 2024, by Cameron Joseph) For related FAC coverage, click here, here and here.

A coalition is mounting a defense against AI-driven lies that could adversely affect the 2024 presidential election. Voters over 65 are particularly vulnerable. Ads are in production for campaigns in swing states of Florida, Pennsylvania, Arizona, Michigan and Wisconsin. (Axios, April 8, 2024, by Ryan Heath) Faking robocalls is now faster and cheaper than even and poses real dangers. A robocall in New Hampshire purported to be in President Joe Biden’s voice and urged voters

Professor Sam Lebovic in Journal of Free Speech Law, April 2024, writes that it is unproductive to think of “fake news as an illegitimate cancerous growth…[and] seek to cut it out of the body politic.” Lebovic argues that “the key task is a broader politics of democratic revitalization, which will include new efforts to improve the “stream of news” by encouraging the production of information in new institutions devoted to that task. Such reform efforts

Meta is ending its news tab on Facebook to reduce its news content before the 2024 elections after criticism of how it deals with false information on its platforms. Mata claimed that those using Facebook News in Australia and the U.S. dropped by over 80 percent last year. (The Associated Press, April 1, 2024, by Sallee Ann Harrison) Research in 2023 showed that half of adults get some news from social media with three-in-ten adults

The Marion County Record filed a lawsuit in the wake of a April 11, 2023 police and sheriff raid on the newspaper and the alleged resultant death of its 98-year-old owner. The newspapers and the Marion city mayor were often at odds. The mayor attempted to get Marion city elected officials to sign a statement giving him to power to dismiss them from office. The attempt followed a failed recall of the then-vice mayor. (The